If you haven't weaned your calves, don't forget the benefit of Cattle Charge. I feel the best way to take care of cattle is not by treating and curing sick cattle, but to keep them from getting sick in the first place.

You may be getting tired of hearing about preconditioning, but we cannot stress it enough. The number one killer of weaned calves is respiratory problems. There are several drugs on the market to treat cattle with respiratory afflictions, but every time one gets sick, it costs you in drugs, performance and labor. To say the animal is treatable assumes that permanent lung damage didn't occur--something that can come back to haunt you when weather turns hot.

I don't know of a better insurance policy than Cattle Charge with AS700. The nutrition of Cattle Charge is so dynamic that calves gain 2 to 3 pounds per day. Calves that are gaining this much are feeling good, healthy and not likely to get sick. The energy and protein blood levels not only allow exceptional gain, but also allows for vaccines to work to their maximum.

So an extra insurance policy is to order Cattle Charge with AS700. The antibiotic and sulfur combination by far outweigh the antibiotic by itself. Furthermore, it does a good job preventing coccidiosis outbreaks among calves on feed. While it costs more than Cattle Charge with Bovatec, it is worth the difference for the first 10 days of preconditioning.

One misconception is that Bovatec will take care of coccidiosis. Bovatec will prevent calves without coccidiosis from getting it as long as they are consuming a milligram per kilogram of body weight of Bovatec. This amounts to 227 mg. of Bovatec for a 500-pound calf eating 10 pounds of feed. The feed would need to contain 22.7 mg. per pound of feed or 45.49 g. per ton--commonly stated as BT45. With Cattle Charge BT34, the 500-pound calf would be getting the needed mg./kg. if it consumed 13 pounds of Cattle Charge BT34. Even at these levels, Bovatec will not stop a break of coccidiosis from occurring on freshly weaned calves.

The message here is to pay the extra money for AS700 for the first week of weaning.

Once the calves are weaned, adjusted and healthy, change to TrendSetter SLR. I personally prefer mixing SLR with 50 percent grain and letting the calves grow. Intakes will be approximately 2 percent of their body weight on this mixture. Weight gains are phenomenal. You can let these calves gain and sell them later or finish them yourself with a mix ratio of 75 percent corn and 25 percent TrendSetter SLR until the animals reach 1,000 pounds. At that point, switch to 87.5 percent corn and 12.5 percent TrendSetter SLR until finish.

These cattle can be fed free-choice in a creep feeder. Place hay or silage out free-choice in a separate bunk. Cattle on these finishing rations will eat 2.5 to 3 percent of their body weight. Conversions will be approximately 6:1 and the cattle will grade. TrendSetter SLR allows you to conveniently put weight on your calves without the risk of founder or acidosis. Simply put out a creep feeder full of TrendSetter SLR and allow cattle access to roughage. This roughage can be hay silage, corn stalks, wheat pasture or stockpiled fescue.

Quick guide for feeding through finish